Nonlocal regularization of L. C. Young's tacking problem (Q1188290)

L. C. Young's tacking problem is to find \(f: [-1,1]\to{\mathbf R}\) such that \(\int^ 1_{-1} [f(x)^ 2+(f'(x)-1)^ 2]dx\) is minimized. Since the infimum of possible values is 0 and cannot be realized by a classical function, Young introduced measure-valued solutions. Subsequent to Young's work, various possible modifications of his problem have been considered. The authors consider minimizing the following non-local generalization: \[ \int^ 1_{-1} [f(x)^ 2+(f'(x)-1)^ 2] dx-C \int^ 1_{-1} \int^ 1_{-1} e^{-\gamma| x-y|} f'(x)f'(y)dx dy. \] Again the functional must be extended to measure- valued functions. The authors show existence of a minimizer in the class of measure-valued functions, and introduce a related problem for which classical solutions exist and from which the measure-valued solution can be constructed. The form of the minimizers is shown to have an interesting dependence on the choice of \(\gamma\) and \(C\).